Chapter 5

A Laceration in the Drawing-Room

BUT in the drawing-room the conversation
was already over. Katerina Ivanovna was greatly excited, though she looked
resolute. At the moment Alyosha and Madame Hohlakov entered, Ivan Fyodorovitch
stood up to take leave. His face was rather pale, and Alyosha looked
at him anxiously. For this moment was to solve a doubt, a harassing enigma
which had for some time haunted Alyosha. During the preceding month it
had been several times suggested to him that his brother Ivan was in
love with Katerina Ivanovna, and, what was more, that he meant "to
carry her off from Dmitri. Until quite lately the idea seemed to Alyosha
monstrous, though it worried him extremely. He loved both his brothers,
and dreaded such rivalry between them. Meantime, Dmitri had said outright
on the previous day that he was glad that Ivan was his rival, and that
it was a great assistance to him, Dmitri. In what way did it assist him?
To marry Grushenka? But that Alyosha considered the worst thing possible.
Besides all this, Alyosha had till the evening before implicitly believed
that Katerina Ivanovna had a steadfast and passionate love for Dmitri;
but he had only believed it till the evening before. He had fancied,
too, that she was incapable of loving a man like Ivan, and that she did
love Dmitri, and loved him just as he was, in spite of all the strangeness
of such a passion.

But during yesterday's
scene with Grushenka another idea had struck him. The word "lacerating," which
Madame Hohlakov had just uttered, almost made him start, because half
waking up towards daybreak that night he had cried out "Laceration,
laceration," probably applying it to his dream. He had been dreaming
all night of the previous day's scene at Katerina Ivanovna's. Now Alyosha
was impressed by Madame Hohlakov's blunt and persistent assertion that
Katerina Ivanovna was in love with Ivan, and only deceived herself through
some sort of pose, from "self-laceration," and tortured herself
by her pretended love for Dmitri from some fancied duty of gratitude. "Yes," he
thought, "perhaps the whole truth lies in those words." But
in that case what was Ivan's position? Alyosha felt instinctively that
a character like Katerina Ivanovna's must dominate, and she could only
dominate someone like Dmitri, and never a man like Ivan. For Dmitri might-
at last submit to her domination "to his own happiness" (which
was what Alyosha would have desired), but Ivan- no, Ivan could not submit
to her, and such submission would not give him happiness. Alyosha could
not help believing that of Ivan. And now all these doubts and reflections
flitted through his mind as he entered the drawing-room. Another idea,
too, forced itself upon him: "What if she loved neither of them-
neither Ivan nor Dmitri?"

It must be noted
that Alyosha felt as it were ashamed of his own thoughts and blamed himself
when they kept recurring to him during the last month. "What do
I know about love and women and how can I decide such questions?" he
thought reproachfully, after such doubts and surmises. And yet it was
impossible not to think about it. He felt instinctively that this rivalry
was of immense importance in his brothers' lives and that a great deal
depended upon it.

"One reptile
will devour the other," Ivan had pronounced the day before, speaking
in anger of his father and Dmitri. So Ivan looked upon Dmitri as a reptile,
and perhaps long done so. Was it perhaps since he had known Katerina
Ivanovna? That phrase had, of course, escaped Ivan unawares yesterday,
but that only made it more important. If he felt like that, what chance
was there of peace? Were there not, on the contrary, new grounds for
hatred and hostility in their family? And with which of them was Alyosha
to sympathise? And what was he to wish for each of them? He loved them
both, but what could he desire for each in the midst of these conflicting
interests? He might go quite astray in this maze, and Alyosha's heart
could not endure uncertainty, because his love was always of an active
character. He was incapable of passive love. If he loved anyone, he set
to work at once to help him. And to do so he must know what he was aiming
at; he must know for certain what was best for each, and having ascertained
this it was natural for him to help them both. But instead of a definite
aim, he found nothing but uncertainty and perplexity on all sides. "It
was lacerating," as was said just now. But what could he understand
even in this "laceration"? He did not understand the first
word in this perplexing maze.

Seeing Alyosha,
Katerina Ivanovna said quickly and joyfully to Ivan, who had already
got up to go, "A minute! Stay another minute! I want to hear the
opinion of this person here whom I trust absolutely. Don't go away," she
added, addressing Madame Hohlakov. She made Alyosha sit down beside her,
and Madame Hohlakov sat opposite, by Ivan.

"You are
all my friends here, all I have in the world, dear friends," she
warmly, in a voice which quivered with genuine tears of suffering, and
Alyosha's heart warmed to her at once. "You, Alexey Fyodorovitch,
were witness yesterday of that abominable scene, and saw what I did.
You did not see it, Ivan Fyodorovitch, he did. What he thought of me
yesterday I don't know. I only know one thing, that if it were repeated
to-day, this minute, I should express the same feelings again as yesterday-
the same feelings, the same words, the same actions. You remember my
actions, Alexey Fyodorovitch; you checked me in one of them"...
(as she said that, she flushed and her eyes shone). "I must tell
you that I can't get over it. Listen, Alexey Fyodorovitch. I don't even
know whether I still love him. I feel pity for him, and that is a poor
sign of love. If I loved him, if I still loved him, perhaps I shouldn't
be sorry for him now, but should hate him"

.Her voice quivered
and tears glittered on her eyelashes. Alyosha shuddered inwardly. "That
girl is truthful and sincere," he thought, "and she does not
love Dmitri any more."

"That's
true, that's true," cried Madame Hohlakov.

"Wait, dear.
I haven't told you the chief, the final decision I came to during the
night. I feel that perhaps my decision is a terrible one- for me, but
I foresee that nothing will induce me to change it- nothing. It will
be so all my life. My dear, kind, ever-faithful and generous adviser,
the one friend I have in the world, Ivan Fyodorovitch, with his deep
insight into the heart, approves and commends my decision. He knows it."

"Yes, I
approve of it," Ivan assented, in a subdued but firm voice.

"But I should
like Alyosha, too (Ah! Alexey Fyodorovitch, forgive my calling you simply
Alyosha), I should like Alexey Fyodorovitch, too, to tell me before my
two friends whether I am right. I feel instinctively that you, Alyosha,
my dear brother (for are a dear brother to me)," she said again
ecstatically, taking his cold hand in her hot one, "I foresee that
your decision, your approval, will bring me peace, in spite of all my
sufferings, for, after your words, I shall be calm and submit- I feel
that."

"I don't
know what you are asking me," said Alyosha, flushing. "I only
know that I love you and at this moment wish for your happiness more
than my own!... But I know nothing about such affairs," something
impelled him to add hurriedly.

"In such
affairs, Alexey Fyodorovitch, in such affairs, the chief thing is honour
and duty and something higher- I don't know what but higher perhaps even
than duty. I am conscious of this irresistible feeling in my heart, and
it compels me irresistibly. But it may all be put in two words. I've
already decided, even if he marries that- creature," she began solemnly, "whom
I never, never can forgive, even then I will not abandon him. Henceforward
I will never, never abandon him!" she cried, breaking into a sort
of pale, hysterical ecstasy. "Not that I would run after him continually,
get in his way and worry him. Oh, no! I will go away to another town-
where you like- but I will watch over him all my life- I will watch over
him all my life unceasingly. When he becomes unhappy with that woman,
and that is bound to happen quite soon, let him come to me and he will
find a friend, a sister... Only a sister, of course, and so for ever;
but he will learn at least that that sister is really his sister, who
loves him and has sacrificed all her life to him. I will gain my point.
I will insist on his knowing me confiding entirely in me, without reserve," she
cried, in a sort of frenzy. "I will be a god to whom he can pray-
and that, at least, he owes me for his treachery and for what I suffered
yesterday through him. And let him see that all my life I will be true
to him and the promise I gave him, in spite of his being untrue and betraying
me. I will- I will become nothing but a means for his happiness, or-
how shall I say?- an instrument, a machine for his happiness, and that
for my whole life, my whole life, and that he may see that all his life!
That's my decision. Ivan Fyodorovitch fully approves me."

She was breathless.
She had perhaps intended to express her idea with more dignity, art and
naturalness, but her speech was too hurried and crude. It was full of
youthful impulsiveness, it betrayed that she was still smarting from
yesterday's insult, and that her pride craved satisfaction. She felt
this herself. Her face suddenly darkened, an unpleasant look came into
her eyes. Alyosha at once saw it and felt a pang of sympathy. His brother
Ivan made it worse by adding:

"I've only
expressed my own view," he said. "From anyone else, this would
have been affected and over-strained, but from you- no. Any other woman
would have been wrong, but you are right. I don't know how to explain
it, but I see that you are absolutely genuine and, therefore, you are
right."

"But that's
only for the moment. And what does this moment stand for? Nothing but
yesterday's insult." Madame Hohlakov obviously had not intended
to interfere, but she could not refrain from this very just comment.

"Quite so,
quite so," cried Ivan, with peculiar eagerness, obviously annoyed
at being interrupted, "in anyone else this moment would be only
due to yesterday's impression and would be only a moment. But with Katerina
Ivanovna's character, that moment will last all her life. What for anyone
else would be only a promise is for her an everlasting burdensome, grim
perhaps, but unflagging duty. And she will be sustained by the feeling
of this duty being fulfilled. Your life, Katerina Ivanovna, will henceforth
be spent in painful brooding over your own feelings, your own heroism,
and your own suffering; but in the end that suffering will be softened
and will pass into sweet contemplation of the fulfilment of a bold and
proud design. Yes, proud it certainly is, and desperate in any case,
but a triumph for you. And the consciousness of it will at last be a
source of complete satisfaction and will make you resigned to everything
else."

This was unmistakably
said with some malice and obviously with intention; even perhaps with
no desire to conceal that he spoke ironically and with intention.

"Oh, dear,
how mistaken it all is!" Madame Hohlakov cried again.

"Alexey
Fyodorovitch, you speak. I want dreadfully to know what you will say!" cried
Katerina Ivanovna, and burst into tears. Alyosha got up from the sofa.

"It's nothing,
nothing!" she went on through her tears. "I'm upset, I didn't
sleep last night. But by the side of two such friends as you and your
brother I still feel strong- for I know you two will never desert me."

"Unluckily
I am obliged to return to Moscow- perhaps to-morrow- and to leave you
for a long time- and, unluckily, it's unavoidable," Ivan said suddenly.

"To-morrow-
to Moscow!" her face was suddenly contorted; "but- but, dear
me, how fortunate!" she cried in a voice suddenly changed. In one
instant there was no trace left of her tears. She underwent an instantaneous
transformation, which amazed Alyosha. Instead of a poor, insulted girl,
weeping in a sort of "laceration," he saw a woman completely
self-possessed and even exceedingly pleased, as though something agreeable
had just happened.

"Oh, not
fortunate that I am losing you, of course not," she collected herself
suddenly, with a charming society smile. "Such a friend as you are
could not suppose that. I am only too unhappy at losing you." She
rushed impulsively at Ivan, and seizing both his hands, pressed them
warmly. "But what is fortunate is that you will be able in Moscow
to see auntie and Agafya and to tell them all the horror of my present
position. You can speak with complete openness to Agafya, but spare dear
auntie. You will know how to do that. You can't think how wretched I
was yesterday and this morning, wondering how I could write them that
dreadful letter- for one can never tell such things in a letter... Now
it will be easy for me to write, for you will see them and explain everything.
Oh, how glad I am! But I am only glad of that, believe me. Of course,
no one can take your place.... I will run at once to write the letter," she
finished suddenly, and took a step as though to go out of the room.

"And what
about Alyosha and his opinion, which you were so desperately anxious
to hear?" cried Madame Hohlakov. There was a sarcastic, angry note
in her voice.

"I had not
forgotten that," cried Katerina Ivanovna, coming to a sudden standstill, "and
why are you so antagonistic at such a moment?" she added, with warm
and bitter reproachfulness. "What I said, I repeat. I must have
his opinion. More than that, I must have his decision! As he says, so
it shall be. You see how anxious I am for your words, Alexey Fyodorovitch...
But what's the matter?"

"He is going
to Moscow, and you cry out that you are glad. You said that on purpose!
And you begin explaining that you are not glad of that but sorry to be-
losing a friend. But that was acting, too- you were playing a part as
in a theatre!"

"Though
you assure him you are sorry to lose a friend in him, you persist in
telling him to his face that it's fortunate he is going," said Alyosha
breathlessly. He was standing at the table and did not sit down.

"What are
you talking about? I don't understand."

"I don't
understand myself.... I seemed to see in a flash... I know I am not saying
it properly, but I'll say it all the same," Alyosha went on in the
same shaking and broken voice. "What I see is that perhaps you don't
love Dmitri at all... and never have, from the beginning.... And Dmitri,
too, has never loved you... and only esteems you.... I really don't know
how I dare to say all this, but somebody must tell the truth... for nobody
here will tell the truth."

"What truth?" cried
Katerina Ivanovna,and there was an hysterical ring in her voice.

"I'll tell
you," Alyosha went on with desperate haste, as though he were jumping
from the top of a house. "Call Dmitri; I will fetch him and let
him come here and take your hand and take Ivan's and join your hands.
For you're torturing Ivan, simply because you love him- and torturing
him, because you love Dmitri through 'self-laceration'-with an unreal
love- because you've persuaded yourself."

Alyosha broke
off and was silent.

"You...
you... you are a little religious idiot- that's what you are!" Katerina
Ivanovna snapped. Her face was white and her lips were moving with anger.

Ivan suddenly
laughed and got up. His hat was in his hand.

"You are
mistaken, my good Alyosha," he said, with an expression Alyosha
had never seen in his face before- an expression of youthful sincerity
and strong, irresistibly frank feeling. "Katerina Ivanovna has never
cared for me! She has known all the time that I cared for her- though
I never said a word of my love to her- she knew, but she didn't care
for me. I have never been her friend either, not for one moment; she
is too proud to need my friendship. She kept me at her side as a means
of revenge. She revenged with me and on me all the insults which she
has been continually receiving from Dmitri ever since their first meeting.
For even that first meeting has rankled in her heart as an insult- that's
what her heart is like! She has talked to me of nothing but her love
for him. I am going now; but, believe me, Katerina Ivanovna, you really
love him. And the more he insults you, the more you love him- that's
your 'laceration.' You love him just as he is; you love him for insulting
you. If he reformed, you'd give him up at once and cease to love him.
But you need him so as to contemplate continually your heroic fidelity
and to reproach him for infidelity. And it all comes from your pride.
Oh, there's a great deal of humiliation and self-abasement about it,
but it all comes from pride.... I am too young and I've loved you too
much. I know that I ought not to say this, that it would be more dignified
on my part simply to leave you, and it would be less offensive for you.
But I am going far away, and shall never come back.... It is for ever.
I don't want to sit beside a 'laceration.'... But I don't know how to
speak now. I've said everything.... Good-bye, Katerina Ivanovna; you
can't be angry with me, for I am a hundred times more severely punished
than you, if only by the fact that I shall never see you again. Good-bye!
I don't want your hand. You have tortured me too deliberately for me
to be able to forgive you at this moment. I shall forgive you later,
but now I don't want your hand. Den Dank, Dame, begehr ich nicht,"*
he added, with a forced smile, showing, however, that he could read Schiller,
and read him till he knew him by heart- which Alyosha would never have
believed. He went out of the room without saying good-bye even to his
hostess, Madame Hohlakov. Alyosha clasped his hands.

"You have
done no harm. You behaved beautifully, like an angel," Madame Hohlakov
whispered rapidly and ecstatically to Alyosha. "I will do my utmost
to prevent Ivan Fyodorovitch from going."

Her face beamed
with delight, to the great distress of Alyosha, but Katerina Ivanovna
suddenly returned. She had two hundred-rouble notes in her hand.

"I have
a great favour to ask of you, Alexey Fyodorovitch," she began, addressing
Alyosha with an apparently calm and even voice, as though nothing had
happened. "A week- yes, I think it was a week ago- Dmitri Fyodorovitch
was guilty of a hasty and unjust action- a very ugly action. There is
a low tavern here, and in it he met that discharged officer, that captain,
whom your father used to employ in some business. Dmitri Fyodorovitch
somehow lost his temper with this captain, seized him by the beard and
dragged him out into the street and for some distance along it, in that
insulting fashion. And I am told that his son, a boy, quite a child,
who is at the school here, saw it and ran beside them crying and begging
for his father, appealing to everyone to defend him, while everyone laughed.
You must forgive me, Alexey Fyodorovitch, I cannot think without indignation
of that disgraceful action of his... one of those actions of which only
Dmitri Fyodorovitch would be capable in his anger... and in his passions!
I can't describe it even.... I can't find my words. I've made inquiries
about his victim, and find he is quite a poor man. His name is Snegiryov.
He did something wrong in the army and was discharged. I can't tell you
what. And now he has sunk into terrible destitution, with his family-
an unhappy family of sick children, and, I believe, an insane wife. He
has been living here a long time; he used to work as a copying clerk,
but now he is getting nothing. I thought if you... that is I thought...
I don't know. I am so confused. You see, I wanted to ask you, my dear
Alexey Fyodorovitch, to go to him, to find some excuse to go to them-
I mean to that captain- oh, goodness, how badly I explain it!- and delicately,
carefully, as only you know how to" (Alyosha blushed), "manage
to give him this assistance, these two hundred roubles. He will be sure
to take it.... I mean, persuade him to take it.... Or, rather, what do
I mean? You see it's not by way of compensation to prevent him from taking
proceedings (for I believe he meant to), but simply a token of sympathy,
of a desire to assist him from me, Dmitri Fyodorovitch's betrothed, not
from himself.... But you know.... I would go myself, but you'll know
how to do it ever so much better. He lives in Lake Street in the house
of a woman called Kalmikov.... For God's sake, Alexey Fyodorovitch, do
it for me, and now... now I am rather... tired... Good-bye!"

She turned and
disappeared behind the portiere so quickly that Alyosha had not time
to utter a word, though he wanted to speak. He longed to beg her pardon,
to blame himself, to say something, for his heart was full and he could
not bear to go out of the room without it. But Madame Hohlakov took him
by the hand and drew him along with her. In the hall she stopped him
again as before.

"She is
proud, she is struggling with herself; but kind, charming, generous, "she
exclaimed, in a half-whisper. "Oh, how I love her, especially sometimes,
and how glad I am again of everything! Dear Alexey Fyodorovitch, you
didn't know, but I must tell you, that we all, all- both her aunts, I
and all of us, Lise, even- have been hoping and praying for nothing for
the last month but that she may give up your favourite Dmitri, who takes
no notice of her and does not care for her, and may marry Ivan Fyodorovitch-
such an excellent and cultivated young man, who loves her more than anything
in the world. We are in a regular plot to bring it about, and I am even
staying on here perhaps on that account."

"But she
has been crying- she has been wounded again," cried Alyosha.

"Never trust
a woman's tears, Alexey Fyodorovitch. I am never for the women in such
cases. I am always on the side of the men."

"Mamma,
you are spoiling him," Lise's little voice cried from behind the
door.

"No, it
was all my fault. I am horribly to blame," Alyosha repeated unconsoled,
hiding his face in his hands in an agony of remorse for his indiscretion.

"Quite the
contrary; you behaved like an angel, like an angel. I am ready to say
so a thousand times over."

"Mamma,
how has he behaved like an angel?" Lise's voice was heard again.

"I somehow
fancied all at once," Alyosha went on as though he had not heard
Lise, "that she loved Ivan, and so I said that stupid thing....
What will happen now?"

"To whom,
to whom?" cried Lise. "Mamma, you really want to be the death
of me. I ask you and you don't answer."

At the moment
the maid ran in.

"Katerina
Ivanovna is ill.... She is crying, struggling... hysterics."

"What is
the matter?" cried Lise, in a tone of real anxiety. "Mamma,
I shall be having hysterics, and not she!"

"Lise, for
mercy's sake, don't scream, don't persecute me. At your age one can't
know everything that grown-up people know. I'll come and tell you everything
you ought to know. Oh, mercy on us! I am coming, I am coming.... Hysterics
is a good sign, Alexey Fyodorovitch; it's an excellent thing that she
is hysterical. That's just as it ought to be. In such cases I am always
against the woman, against all these feminine tears and hysterics. Run
and say, Yulia, that I'll fly to her. As for Ivan Fyodorovitch's going
away like that, it's her own fault. But he won't go away. Lise, for mercy's
sake, don't scream! Oh, yes; you are not screaming. It's I am screaming.
Forgive your mamma; but I am delighted, delighted, delighted! Did you
notice, Alexey Fyodorovitch, how young, how young Ivan Fyodorovitch was
just now when he went out, when he said all that and went out? I thought
he was so learned, such a savant, and all of a sudden he behaved so warmly,
openly, and youthfully, with such youthful inexperience, and it was all
so fine, like you.... And the way he repeated that German verse, it was
just like you! But I must fly, I must fly! Alexey Fyodorovitch, make
haste to carry out her commission, and then make haste back. Lise, do
you want anything now? For mercy's sake, don't keep Alexey Fyodorovitch
a minute. He will come back to you at once."

Madame Hohlakov
at last ran off. Before leaving, Alyosha would have opened the door to
see Lise.

"On no account," cried
Lise. "On no account now. Speak through the door. How have you come
to be an angel? That's the only thing I want to know."

"For an
awful piece of stupidity, Lise! Goodbye!"

"Don't dare
to go away like that!" Lise was beginning.

"Lise, I
have a real sorrow! I'll be back directly, but I have a great, great
sorrow!

And he ran out
of the room.

Chapter 6

A Laceration in the Cottage

HE certainly was really grieved in a
way he had seldom been before. He had rushed in like a fool, and meddled
in what? In a love-affair. "But what do I know about it? What can
I tell about such things?" he repeated to himself for the hundredth
time, flushing crimson. "Oh, being ashamed would be nothing; shame
is only the punishment I deserve. The trouble is I shall certainly have
caused more unhappiness.... And Father Zossima sent me to reconcile and
bring them together. Is this the way to bring them together?" Then
he suddenly remembered how he had tried to join their hands, and he felt
fearfully ashamed again. "Though I acted quite sincerely, I must
be more sensible in the future," he concluded suddenly, and did
not even smile at his conclusion.

Katerina Ivanovna's
commission took him to Lake Street, and his brother Dmitri lived close
by, in a turning out of Lake Street. Alyosha decided to go to him in
any case before going to the captain, though he had a presentiment that
he would not find his brother. He suspected that he would intentionally
keep out of his way now, but he must find him anyhow. Time was passing:
the thought of his dying elder had not left Alyosha for one minute from
the time he set off from the monastery.

There was one
point which interested him particularly about Katerina Ivanovna's commission;
when she had mentioned the captain's son, the little schoolboy who had
run beside his father crying, the idea had at once struck Alyosha that
this must be the schoolboy who had bitten his finger when he, Alyosha,
asked him what he had done to hurt him. Now Alyosha felt practically
certain of this, though he could not have said why. Thinking of another
subject was a relief, and he resolved to think no more about the "mischief" he
had done, and not to torture himself with remorse, but to do what he
had to do, let come what would. At that thought he was completely comforted.
Turning to the street where Dmitri lodged, he felt hungry, and taking
out of his pocket the roll he had brought from his father's, he ate it.
It made him feel stronger.

Dmitri was not
at home. The people of the house, an old cabinet-maker, his son, and
his old wife, looked with positive suspicion at Alyosha. "He hasn't
slept here for the last three nights. Maybe he has gone away," the
old man said in answer to Alyosha's persistent inquiries. Alyosha saw
that he was answering in accordance with instructions. When he asked
whether he were not at Grushenka's or in hiding at Foma's (Alyosha spoke
so freely on purpose), all three looked at him in alarm. "They are
fond of him, they are doing their best for him," thought Alyosha. "That's
good."

At last he found
the house in Lake Street. It was a decrepit little house, sunk on one
side, with three windows looking into the street, and with a muddy yard,
in the middle of which stood a solitary cow. He crossed the yard and
found the door opening into the passage. On the left of the passage lived
the old woman of the house with her old daughter. Both seemed to be deaf.
In answer to his repeated inquiry for the captain, one of them at last
understood that he was asking for their lodgers, and pointed to a door
across the passage. The captain's lodging turned out to be a simple cottage
room. Alyosha had his hand on the iron latch to open the door, when he
was struck by the strange hush within. Yet he knew from Katerina Ivanovna's
words that the man had a family. "Either they are all asleep or
perhaps they have heard me coming and are waiting for me to open the
door. I'd better knock first," and he knocked. An answer came, but
not at once, after an interval of perhaps ten seconds.

"Who's there?" shouted
someone in a loud and very angry voice.

Then Alyosha
opened the door and crossed the threshold. He found himself in a regular
peasant's room. Though it was large, it was cumbered up with domestic
belongings of all sorts, and there were several people in it. On the
left was a large Russian stove. From the stove to the window on the left
was a string running across the room, and on it there were rags hanging.
There was a bedstead against the wall on each side, right and left, covered
with knitted quilts. On the one on the left was a pyramid of four print-covered
pillows, each smaller than the one beneath. On the other there was only
one very small pillow. The opposite corner was screened off by a curtain
or a sheet hung on a string. Behind this curtain could be seen a bed
made up on a bench and a chair. The rough square table of plain wood
had been moved into the middle window. The three windows, which consisted
each of four tiny greenish mildewy panes, gave little light, and were
close shut, so that the room was not very light and rather stuffy. On
the table was a frying pan with the remains of some fried eggs, a half-eaten
piece of bread, and a small bottle with a few drops of vodka.

A woman of genteel
appearance, wearing a cotton gown, was sitting on a chair by the bed
on the left. Her face was thin and yellow, and her sunken cheeks betrayed
at the first glance that she was ill. But what struck Alyosha most was
the expression in the poor woman's eyes- a look of surprised inquiry
and yet of haughty pride. And while he was talking to her husband, her
big brown eyes moved from one speaker to the other with the same haughty
and questioning expression. Beside her at the window stood a young girl,
rather plain, with scanty reddish hair, poorly but very neatly dressed.
She looked disdainfully at Alyosha as he came in. Beside the other bed
was sitting another female figure. She was a very sad sight, a young
girl of about twenty, but hunchback and crippled "with withered
legs," as Alyosha was told afterwards. Her crutches stood in the
corner close by. The strikingly beautiful and gentle eyes of this poor
girl looked with mild serenity at Alyosha. A man of forty-five was sitting
at the table, finishing the fried eggs. He was spare, small, and weakly
built. He had reddish hair and a scanty light-coloured beard, very much
like a wisp of tow (this comparison and the phrase "a wisp of tow" flashed
at once into Alyosha's mind for some reason, he remembered it afterwards).
It was obviously this gentleman who had shouted to him, as there was
no other man in the room. But when Alyosha went in, he leapt up from
the bench on which he was sitting, and, hastily wiping his mouth with
a ragged napkin, darted up to Alyosha.

"It's a
monk come to beg for the monastery. A nice place to come to!" the
girl standing in the left corner said aloud. The man spun round instantly
towards her and answered her in an excited and breaking voice:

"No, Varvara,
you are wrong. Allow me to ask," he turned again to Alyosha, "what
has brought you to our retreat?"

Alyosha looked
attentively at him. It was the first time he had seen him. There was
something angular, flurried and irritable about him. Though he had obviously
just been drinking, he was not drunk. There was extraordinary impudence
in his expression, and yet, strange to say, at the same time there was
fear. He looked like a man who had long been kept in subjection and had
submitted to it, and now had suddenly turned and was trying to assert
himself. Or, better still, like a man who wants dreadfully to hit you
but is horribly afraid you will hit him. In his words and in the intonation
of his shrill voice there was a sort of crazy humour, at times spiteful
and at times cringing, and continually shifting from one tone to another.
The question about "our retreat" he had asked, as it were,
quivering all over, rolling his eyes, and skipping up so close to Alyosha
that he instinctively drew back a step. He was dressed in a very shabby
dark cotton coat, patched and spotted. He wore checked trousers of an
extremely light colour, long out of fashion, and of very thin material.
They were so crumpled and so short that he looked as though he had grown
out of them like a boy.

"I am Alexey
Karamazov," Alyosha began in reply.

"I quite
understand that, sir," the gentleman snapped out at once to assure
him that he knew who he was already. "I am Captain Snegiryov, sir,
but I am still desirous to know precisely what has led you- "

"Oh, I've
come for nothing special. I wanted to have a word with you- if only you
allow me."

"In that
case, here is a chair, sir; kindly be seated. That's what they used to
say in the old comedies, 'kindly be seated,'" and with a rapid gesture
he seized an empty chair (it was a rough wooden chair, not upholstered)
and set it for him almost in the middle of the room; then, taking another
similar chair for himself, he sat down facing Alyosha, so close to him
that their knees almost touched.

"Nikolay
Ilyitch Snegiryov, sir, formerly a captain in the Russian infantry, put
to shame for his vices, but still a captain. Though I might not be one
now for the way I talk; for the last half of my life I've learnt to say
'sir.' It's a word you use when you've come down in the world."

"That's
very true," smiled Alyosha. "But is it used involuntarily or
on purpose?"

"As God's
above, it's involuntary, and I usen't to use it! I didn't use the word
'sir' all my life, but as soon as I sank into low water I began to say
'sir.' It's the work of a higher power. I see you are interested in contemporary
questions, but how can I have excited your curiosity, living as I do
in surroundings impossible for the exercise of hospitality?"

"What meeting,
sir? You don't mean that meeting? About my 'wisp of tow,' then?" He
moved closer so that his knees positively knocked against Alyosha. His
lips were strangely compressed like a thread.

"What wisp
of tow?" muttered Alyosha.

"He is come
to complain of me, father!" cried a voice familiar to Alyosha- the
voice of the schoolboy- from behind the curtain. "I bit his finger
just now." The curtain was pulled, and Alyosha saw his assailant
lying on a little bed made up on the bench and the chair in the corner
under the ikons. The boy lay covered by his coat and an old wadded quilt.
He was evidently unwell, and, judging by his glittering eyes, he was
in a fever. He looked at Alyosha without fear, as though he felt he was
at home and could not be touched.

"What! Did
he bite your finger?" The captain jumped up from his chair. "Was
it your finger he bit?"

"Yes. He
was throwing stones with other schoolboys. There were six of them against
him alone. I went up to him, and he threw a stone at me and then another
at my head. I asked him what I had done to him. And then he rushed at
me and bit my finger badly, I don't know why."

"I'll thrash
him, sir, at once- this minute!" The captain jumped up from his
seat.

"But I am
not complaining at all, I am simply telling you.... I don't want him
to be thrashed. Besides, he seems to be ill."

"And do
you suppose I'd thrash him? That I'd take my Ilusha and thrash him before
you for your satisfaction? Would you like it done at once, sir?" said
the captain, suddenly turning to Alyosha, as though he were going to
attack him. "I am sorry about your finger, sir; but instead of thrashing
Ilusha, would you like me to chop off my four fingers with this knife
here before your eyes to satisfy your just wrath? I should think four
fingers would be enough to satisfy your thirst for vengeance. You won't
ask for the fifth one too?" He stopped short with a catch in his
throat. Every feature in his face was twitching and working; he looked
extremely defiant. He was in a sort of frenzy.

"I think
I understand it all now," said Alyosha gently and sorrowfully, still
keeping his seat. "So your boy is a good boy, he loves his father,
and he attacked me as the brother of your assailant.... Now I understand
it," he repeated thoughtfully. "But my brother Dmitri Fyodorovitch
regrets his action, I know that, and if only it is possible for him to
come to you, or better still, to meet you in that same place, he will
ask your forgiveness before everyone- if you wish it."

"After pulling
out my beard, you mean, he will ask my forgiveness? And he thinks that
will be a satisfactory finish, doesn't he?"

"Oh, no!
On the contrary, he will do anything you like and in any way you like."

"So if I
were to ask his highness to go down on his knees before me in that very
tavern- 'The Metropolis' it's called- or in the marketplace, he would
do it?"

"Yes, he
would even go down on his knees."

"You've
pierced me to the heart, sir. Touched me to tears and pierced me to the
heart! I am only too sensible of your brother's generosity. Allow me
to introduce my family, my two daughters and my son- my litter. If I
die, who will care for them, and while I live who but they will care
for a wretch like me? That's a great thing the Lord has ordained for
every man of my sort, sir. For there must be someone able to love even
a man like me."

"Ah, that's
perfectly true!" exclaimed Alyosha.

"Oh, do
leave off playing the fool! Some idiot comes in, and you put us to shame!" cried
the girl by the window, suddenly turning to her father with a disdainful
and contemptuous air.

"Wait a
little, Varvara!" cried her father, speaking peremptorily but looking
at them quite approvingly. "That's her character," he said,
addressing Alyosha again. "And in all nature there was naught
That could find favour in his eyes-
or rather in the feminine- that could find favour in her eyes- . But now let
me present you to my wife, Arina Petrovna. She is crippled, she is forty-three;
she can move, but very little. She is of humble origin. Arina Petrovna, compose
your countenance. This is Alexey Fyodorovitch Karamazov. Get up, Alexey Fyodorovitch." He
took him by the hand and with unexpected force pulled him up. "You must
stand up to be introduced to a lady. It's not the Karamazov, mamma, who...
h'm... etcetera, but his brother, radiant with modest virtues. Come, Arina
Petrovna, come, mamma, first your hand to be kissed."

And he kissed
his wife's hand respectfully and even tenderly. The girl at the window
turned her back indignantly on the scene; an expression of extraordinary
cordiality came over the haughtily inquiring face of the woman.

"Good morning!
Sit down, Mr. Tchernomazov," she said.

"Karamazov,
mamma, Karamazov. We are of humble origin," he whispered again.

"Well, Karamazov,
or whatever it is, but I always think of Tchermomazov.... Sit down. Why
has he pulled you up? He calls me crippled, but I am not, only my legs
are swollen like barrels, and I am shrivelled up myself. Once I used
to be so fat, but now it's as though I had swallowed a needle."

"We are
of humble origin," the captain muttered again.

"Oh, father,
father!" the hunchback girl, who had till then been silent on her
chair, said suddenly, and she hid her eyes in her handkerchief.

"Buffoon!" blurted
out the girl at the window.

"Have you
heard our news?" said the mother, pointing at her daughters. "It's
like clouds coming over; the clouds pass and we have music again. When
we were with the army, we used to have many such guests. I don't mean
to make any comparisons; everyone to their taste. The deacon's wife used
to come then and say, 'Alexandr Alexandrovitch is a man of the noblest
heart, but Nastasya Petrovna,' she would say, 'is of the brood of hell.'
'Well,' I said, 'that's a matter of taste; but you are a little spitfire.'
'And you want keeping in your place;' says she. 'You black sword,' said
I, 'who asked you to teach me?' 'But my breath,' says she, 'is clean,
and yours is unclean.' 'You ask all the officers whether my breath is
unclean.' And ever since then I had it in my mind. Not long ago I was
sitting here as I am now, when I saw that very general come in who came
here for Easter, and I asked him: 'Your Excellency,' said I, 'can a lady's
breath be unpleasant?' 'Yes,' he answered; 'you ought to open a window-pane
or open the door, for the air is not fresh here.' And they all go on
like that! And what is my breath to them? The dead smell worse still!.
'I won't spoil the air,' said I, 'I'll order some slippers and go away.'
My darlings, don't blame your own mother! Nikolay Ilyitch, how is it
I can't please you? There's only Ilusha who comes home from school and
loves me. Yesterday he brought me an apple. Forgive your own mother-
forgive a poor lonely creature! Why has my breath become unpleasant to
you?"

And the poor
mad woman broke into sobs, and tears streamed down her cheeks. The captain
rushed up to her.

"Mamma,
mamma, my dear, give over! You are not lonely. Everyone loves you, everyone
adores you." He began kissing both her hands again and tenderly
stroking her face; taking the dinner-napkin, he began wiping away her
tears. Alyosha fancied that he too had tears in his eyes. "There,
you see, you hear?" he turned with a sort of fury to Alyosha, pointing
to the poor imbecile.

"I see and
hear," muttered Alyosha.

"Father,
father, how can you- with him! Let him alone!" cried the boy, sitting
up in his bed and gazing at his father with glowing eyes.

"Do give
over fooling, showing off your silly antics which never lead to anything!
shouted Varvara, stamping her foot with passion.

"Your anger
is quite just this time, Varvara, and I'll make haste to satisfy you.
Come, put on your cap, Alexey Fyodorovitch, and I'll put on mine. We
will go out. I have a word to say to you in earnest, but not within these
walls. This girl sitting here is my daughter Nina; I forgot to introduce
her to you. She is a heavenly angel incarnate... who has flown down to
us mortals,... if you can understand."

"There he
is shaking all over, as though he is in convulsions!" Varvara went
on indignantly.

"And she
there stamping her foot at me and calling me a fool just now, she is
a heavenly angel incarnate too, and she has good reason to call me so.
Come along, Alexey Fyodorovitch, we must make an end."

And, snatching
Alyosha's hand, he drew him out of the room into the street.

Chapter 7

And in the Open Air

"THE air is fresh, but in my apartment it is not so in any sense of the word. Let
us walk slowly, sir. I should be glad of your kind interest."

"I too have
something important to say to you," observed Alyosha, "only
I don't know how to begin."

"To be sure
you must have business with me. You would never have looked in upon me
without some object. Unless you come simply to complain of the boy, and
that's hardly likely. And, by the way, about the boy: I could not explain
to you in there, but here I will describe that scene to you. My tow was
thicker a week ago- I mean my beard. That's the nickname they give to
my beard, the schoolboys most of all. Well, your brother Dmitri Fyodorovitch
was pulling me by my beard, I'd done nothing, he was in a towering rage
and happened to come upon me. He dragged me out of the tavern into the
market place; at that moment the boys were coming out of school, and
with them Ilusha. As soon as he saw me in such a state he rushed up to
me. 'Father,' he cried, 'father!' He caught hold of me, hugged me, tried
to pull me away, crying to my assailant, 'Let go, let go, it's my father,
forgive him!'- yes, he actually cried 'forgive him.' He clutched at that
hand, that very hand, in his little hands and kissed it.... I remember
his little face at that moment, I haven't forgotten it and I never shall!"

"I swear," cried
Alyosha, "that my brother will express his most deep and sincere
regret, even if he has to go down on his knees in that same market-place....
I'll make him or he is no brother of mine!

"Aha, then
it's only a suggestion! And it does not come from him but simply from
the generosity of your own warm heart. You should have said so. No, in
that case allow me to tell you of your brother's highly chivalrous soldierly
generosity, for he did give expression to it at the time. He left off
dragging me by my beard and released me: 'You are an officer,' he said,
'and I am an officer, if you can find a decent man to be your second
send me your challenge. I will give satisfaction, though you are a scoundrel.'
That's what he said. A chivalrous spirit indeed! I retired with Ilusha,
and that scene is a family record imprinted forever on Ilusha's soul.
No, it's not for us to claim the privileges of noblemen. Judge for yourself.
You've just been in our mansion, what did you see there? Three ladies,
one a cripple and weak-minded, another a cripple and hunchback and the
third not crippled but far too clever. She is a student, dying to get
back to Petersburg, to work for the emancipation of the Russian woman
on the banks of the Neva. I won't speak of Ilusha, he is only nine. I
am alone in the world, and if I die, what will become of all of them?
I simply ask you that. And if I challenge him and he kills me on the
spot, what then? What will become of them? And worse still, if he doesn't
kill me but only cripples me: I couldn't work, but I should still be
a mouth to feed. Who would feed it and who would feed them all? Must
I take Ilusha from school and send him to beg in the streets? That's
what it means for me to challenge him to a duel. It's silly talk and
nothing else."

"He will
beg your forgiveness, he will bow down at your feet in the middle of
the marketplace," cried Alyosha again, with glowing eyes.

"I did think
of prosecuting him," the captain went on, "but look in our
code, could I get much compensation for a personal injury? And then Agrafena
Alexandrovna* sent for me and shouted at me: 'Don't dare to dream of
it! If you proceed against him, I'll publish it to all the world that
he beat you for your dishonesty, and then you will be prosecuted.' I
call God to witness whose was the dishonesty and by whose commands I
acted, wasn't it by her own and Fyodor Pavlovitch's? And what's more,'
she went on, 'I'll dismiss you for good and you'll never earn another
penny from me. I'll speak to my merchant too' (that's what she calls
her old man) 'and he will dismiss you!' And if he dismisses me, what
can I earn then from anyone? Those two are all I have to look to, for
your Fyodor Pavlovitch has not only given over employing me, for another
reason, but he means to make use of papers I've signed to go to law against
me. And so I kept quiet, and you have seen our retreat. But now let me
ask you: did Ilusha hurt your finger much? I didn't like to go into it
in our mansion before him."

* Grushenka.

"Yes, very
much, and he was in a great fury. He was avenging you on me as a Karamazov,
I see that now. But if only you had seen how he was throwing stones at
his schoolfellows! It's very dangerous. They might kill him. They are
children and stupid. A stone may be thrown and break somebody's head."

"That's
just what has happened. He has been bruised by a stone to-day. Not on
the head but on the chest, just above the heart. He came home crying
and groaning and now he is ill."

"And you
know he attacks them first. He is bitter against them on your account.
They say he stabbed a boy called Krassotkin with a penknife not long
ago."

"I've heard
about that too, it's dangerous. Krassotkin is an official here, we may
hear more about it."

"I would
advise you," Alyosha went on warmly, "not to send him to school
at all for a time till he is calmer. and his anger is passed."

"Anger!" the
captain repeated, "that's just what it is. He is a little creature,
but it's a mighty anger. You don't know all, sir. Let me tell you more.
Since that incident all the boys have been teasing him about the 'wisp
of tow.' Schoolboys are a merciless race, individually they are angels,
but together, especially in schools, they are often merciless. Their
teasing has stiffed up a gallant spirit in Ilusha. An ordinary boy, a
weak son, would have submitted, have felt ashamed of his father, sir,
but he stood up for his father against them all. For his father and for
truth and justice. For what he suffered when he kissed your brother's
hand and cried to him 'Forgive father, forgive him,'- that only God knows-
and I, his father. For our children- not your children, but ours- the
children of the poor gentlemen looked down upon by everyone- know what
justice means, sir, even at nine years old. How should the rich know?
They don't explore such depths once in their lives. But at that moment
in the square when he kissed his hand, at that moment my Ilusha had grasped
all that justice means. That truth entered into him and crushed him for
ever, sir," the captain said hotly again with a sort of frenzy,
and he struck his right fist against his left palm as though he wanted
to show how "the truth" crushed Ilusha. "That very day,
sir, he fell ill with fever and was delirious all night. All that day
he hardly said a word to me, but I noticed he kept watching me from the
corner, though he turned to the window and pretended to be learning his
lessons. But I could see his mind was not on his lessons. Next day I
got drunk to forget my troubles, sinful man as I am, and I don't remember
much. Mamma began crying, too- I am very fond of mamma- well, I spent
my last penny drowning my troubles. Don't despise me for that, sir, in
Russia men who drink are the best. The best men amongst us are the greatest
drunkards. I lay down and I don't remember about Ilusha, though all that
day the boys had been jeering at him at school. 'Wisp of tow,' they shouted,
'your father was pulled out of the tavern by his wisp of tow, you ran
by and begged forgiveness.'

"On the
third day when he came back from school, I saw he looked pale and wretched.
'What is it?' I asked. He wouldn't answer. Well, there's no talking in
our mansion without mamma and the girls taking part in it. What's more,
the girls had heard about it the very first day. Varvara had begun snarling.
'You fools and buffoons, can you ever do anything rational?' 'Quite so,'
I said,' can we ever do anything rational?' For the time I turned it
off like that. So in the evening I took the boy out for a walk, for you
must know we go for a walk every evening, always the same way, along
which we are going now- from our gate to that great stone which lies
alone in the road under the hurdle, which marks the beginning of the
town pasture. A beautiful and lonely spot, sir. Ilusha and I walked along
hand in hand as usual. He has a little hand, his fingers are thin and
cold- he suffers with his chest, you know. 'Father,' said he, 'father!'
'Well?' said I. I saw his eyes flashing. 'Father, how he treated you
then!' 'It can't be helped, Ilusha,' I said. 'Don't forgive him, father,
don't forgive him! At school they say that he has paid you ten roubles
for it.' 'No Ilusha,' said I, 'I would not take money from him for anything.'
he began trembling all over, took my hand in both his and kissed it again.
'Father,' he said, 'father, challenge him to a duel, at school they say
you are a coward and won't challenge him, and that you'll accept ten
roubles from him.' 'I can't challenge him to a duel, Ilusha,' I answered.
And I told briefly what I've just told you. He listened. 'Father,' he
said, anyway don't forgive it. When I grow up I'll call him out myself
and kill him.' His eyes shone and glowed. And of course I am his father,
and I had to put in a word: 'It's a sin to kill,' I said, 'even in a
duel.' 'Father,' he said, 'when I grow up, I'll knock him down, knock
the sword out of his hand, I'll fall on him, wave my sword over him and
say: "I could kill you, but I forgive you, so there!"' You
see what the workings of his little mind have been during these two days;
he must have been planning that vengeance all day, and raving about it
at night.

"But he
began to come home from school badly beaten, I found out about it the
day before yesterday, and you are right, I won't send him to that school
any more. I heard that he was standing up against all the class alone
and defying them all, that his heart was full of resentment, of bitterness-
I was alarmed about him. We went for another walk. 'Father,' he asked,
'are the rich people stronger than anyone else on earth?' 'Yes, Ilusha,'
I said, 'there are no people on earth stronger than the rich.' 'Father,'
he said, 'I will get rich, I will become an officer and conquer everybody.
The Tsar will reward me, I will come back here and then no one will dare-
' Then he was silent and his lips still kept trembling. 'Father,' he
said, 'what a horrid town this is.' 'Yes, Ilusha,' I said, 'it isn't
a very nice town.' 'Father, let us move into another town, a nice one,'
he said, 'where people don't know about us.' 'We will move, we will,
Ilusha,' said I, 'only I must save up for it.' I was glad to be able
to turn his mind from painful thoughts, and we began to dream of how
we would move to another town, how we would buy a horse and cart. 'We
will put mamma and your sisters inside, we will cover them up and we'll
walk, you shall have a lift now and then, and I'll walk beside, for we
must take care of our horse, we can't all ride. That's how we'll go.'
He was enchanted at that, most of all at the thought of having a horse
and driving him. For of course a Russian boy is born among horses. We
chattered a long while. Thank God, I thought, I have diverted his mind
and comforted him.

"That was
the day before yesterday, in the evening, but last night everything was
changed. He had gone to school in the morning, he came back depressed,
terribly depressed. In the evening I took him by the hand and we went
for a walk; he would not talk. There was a wind blowing and no sun, and
a feeling of autumn; twilight was coming on. We walked along, both of
us depressed. 'Well, my boy,' said I, 'how about our setting off on our
travels?' I thought I might bring him back to our talk of the day before.
He didn't answer, but I felt his fingers trembling in my hand. Ah, I
thought, it's a bad job; there's something fresh. We had reached the
stone where we are now. I sat down on the stone. And in the air there
were lots of kites flapping and whirling. There were as many as thirty
in sight. Of course, it's just the season for the kites. 'Look, Ilusha,'
said I, 'it's time we got out our last year's kite again. I'll mend it;
where have you put it away?' My boy made no answer. He looked away and
turned sideways to me. And then a gust of wind blew up the sand. He suddenly
fell on me, threw both his little arms round my neck and held me tight.
You know, when children are silent and proud, and try to keep back their
tears when they are in great trouble and suddenly break down, their tears
fall in streams. With those warm streams of tears, he suddenly wetted
my face. He sobbed and shook as though he were in convulsions, and squeezed
up against me as I sat on the stone. 'Father,' he kept crying, 'dear
father, how he insulted you!' And I sobbed too. We sat shaking in each
other's arms. 'Ilusha,' I said to him, 'Ilusha, darling.' No one saw
us then. God alone saw us; I hope He will record it to my credit. You
must thank your brother, Alexey Fyodorovitch. No, sir, I won't thrash
my boy for your satisfaction."

He had gone back
to his original tone of resentful buffoonery. Alyosha felt, though, that
he trusted him, and that if there had been someone else in his, Alyosha's
place, the man would not have spoken so openly and would not have told
what he had just told. This encouraged Alyosha, whose heart was trembling
on the verge of tears.

"Ah, how
I would like to make friends with your boy!" he cried. "If
you could arrange it- "

"Certainly,
sir," muttered the captain.

"But now
listen to something quite different!" Alyosha went on. "I have
a message for you. That same brother of mine, Dmitri, has insulted his
betrothed, too, a noble-hearted girl of whom you have probably heard.
I have a right to tell you of her wrong; I ought to do so, in fact, for,
hearing of the insult done to you and learning all about your unfortunate
position, she commissioned me at once- just now- to bring you this help
from her- but only from her alone, not from Dmitri, who has abandoned
her. Nor from me, his brother, nor from anyone else, but from her, only
from her! She entreats you to accept her help....You have both been insulted
by the same man. She thought of you only when she had just received a
similar insult from him- similar in its cruelty, I mean. She comes like
a sister to help a brother in misfortune.... She told me to persuade
you to take these two hundred roubles from her, as from a sister, knowing
that you are in such need. No one will know of it, it can give rise to
no unjust slander. There are the two hundred roubles, and I swear you
must take them unless- unless all men are to be enemies on earth! But
there are brothers even on earth.... You have a generous heart... you
must see that, you must," and Alyosha held out two new rainbow-coloured
hundred-rouble notes.

They were both
standing at the time by the great stone close to the fence, and there
was no one near. The notes seemed to produce a tremendous impression
on the captain. He started, but at first only from astonishment. Such
an outcome of their conversation was the last thing he expected. Nothing
could have been farther from his dreams than help from anyone- and such
a sum!

He took the notes,
and for a minute he was almost unable to answer, quite a new expression
came into his face.

"That for
me? So much money- two hundred roubles! Good heavens! Why, I haven't
seen so much money for the last four years! Mercy on us! And she says
she is a sister.... And is that the truth?"

"I swear
that all I told you is the truth," cried Alyosha.

The captain flushed
red.

"Listen,
my dear, listen. If I take it, I shan't be behaving like a scoundrel?
In your eyes, Alexey Fyodorovitch, I shan't be a scoundrel? No, Alexey
Fyodorovitch, listen, listen," he hurried, touching Alyosha with
both his hands. "You are persuading me to take it, saying that it's
a sister sends it, but inwardly, in your heart won't you feel contempt
for me if I take it, eh?"

"No, no,
on my salvation I swear I shan't! And no one will ever know but me- I,
you and she, and one other lady, her great friend."

"Never mind
the lady! Listen, Alexey Fyodorovitch, at a moment like this you must
listen, for you can't understand what these two hundred roubles mean
to me now." The poor fellow went on rising gradually into a sort
of incoherent, almost wild enthusiasm. He was thrown off his balance
and talked extremely fast, as though afraid he would not be allowed to
say all he had to say.

"Besides
its being honestly acquired from a 'sister,' so highly respected and
revered, do you know that now I can look after mamma and Nina, my hunchback
angel daughter? Doctor Herzenstube came to me in the kindness of his
heart and was examining them both for a whole hour. 'I can make nothing
of it,' said he, but he prescribed a mineral water which is kept at a
chemist's here. He said it would be sure to do her good, and he ordered
baths, too, with some medicine in them. The mineral water costs thirty
copecks, and she'd need to drink forty bottles perhaps: so I took the
prescription and laid it on the shelf under the ikons, and there it lies.
And he ordered hot baths for Nina with something dissolved in them, morning
and evening. But how can we carry out such a cure in our mansion, without
servants, without help, without a bath, and without water? Nina is rheumatic
all over, I don't think I told you that. All her right side aches at
night, she is in agony, and, would you believe it, the angel bears it
without groaning for fear of waking us. We eat what we can get, and she'll
only take the leavings, what you'd scarcely give to a dog. 'I am not
worth it, I am taking it from you, I am a burden on you,' that's what
her angel eyes try to express. We wait on her, but she doesn't like it.
'I am a useless cripple, no good to anyone.' As though she were not worth
it, when she is the saving of all of us with her angelic sweetness. Without
her, without her gentle word it would be hell among us! She softens even
Varvara. And don't judge Varvara harshly either, she is an angel too,
she, too, has suffered wrong. She came to us for the summer, and she
brought sixteen roubles she had earned by lessons and saved up, to go
back with to Petersburg in September, that is now. But we took her money
and lived on it, so now she has nothing to go back with. Though indeed
she couldn't go back, for she has to work for us like a slave. She is
like an overdriven horse with all of us on her back. She waits on us
all, mends and washes, sweeps the floor, puts mamma to bed. And mamma
is capricious and tearful and insane! And now I can get a servant with
this money, you understand, Alexey Fyodorovitch, I can get medicines
for the dear creatures, I can send my student to Petersburg, I can buy
beef, I can feed them properly. Good Lord, but it's a dream!"

Alyosha was delighted
that he had brought him such happiness and that the poor fellow had consented
to be made happy.

"Stay, Alexey
Fyodorovitch, stay," the captain began to talk with frenzied rapidity,
carried away by a new day-dream. "Do you know that Ilusha and I
will perhaps really carry out our dream. We will buy a horse and cart,
a black horse, he insists on its being black, and we will set off as
we pretended the other day. I have an old friend, a lawyer in K. province,
and I heard through a trustworthy man that if I were to go he'd give
me a place as clerk in his office, so, who knows, maybe he would. So
I'd just put mamma and Nina in the cart, and Ilusha could drive, and
I'd walk, I'd walk.... Why, if I only succeed in getting one debt paid
that's owing me, I should have perhaps enough for that too!"

"There would
be enough!" cried Alyosha. "Katerina Ivanovna will send you
as much more as you need, and you know, I have money too, take what you
want, as you would from a brother, from a friend, you can give it back
later.... (You'll get rich. you'll get rich!) And you know you couldn't
have a better idea than to move to another province! It would be the
saving of you, especially of your boy and you ought to go quickly, before
the winter, before the cold. You must write to us when you are there,
and we will always be brothers... No, it's not a dream!"

Alyosha could
have hugged him, he was so pleased. But glancing at him he stopped short.
The man was standing with his neck outstretched and his lips protruding,
with a pale and frenzied face. His lips were moving as though trying
to articulate something; no sound came, but still his lips moved. It
was uncanny.

"What is
it?" asked Alyosha, startled.

"Alexey
Fyodorovitch... I... you," muttered the captain, faltering, looking
at him with a strange, wild, fixed stare, and an air of desperate resolution.
At the same time there was a sort of grin on his lips. "I... you,
sir... wouldn't you like me to show you a little trick I know?" he
murmured, suddenly, in a firm rapid whisper, his voice no longer faltering.

"What trick?"

"A pretty
trick," whispered the captain. His mouth was twisted on the left
side, his left eye was screwed up. He still stared at Alyosha.

"What is
the matter? What trick?" Alyosha cried, now thoroughly alarmed.

"Why, look," squealed
the captain suddenly, and showing him the two notes which he had been
holding by one corner between his thumb and forefinger during the conversation,
he crumpled them up savagely and squeezed them tight in his right hand. "Do
you see, do you see?" he shrieked, pale and infuriated. And suddenly
flinging up his hand, he threw the crumpled notes on the sand. "Do
you see?" he shrieked again, pointing to them. "Look there!"

And with wild
fury he began trampling them under his heel, gasping and exclaiming as
he did so:

"So much
for your money! So much for your money! So much for your money! So much
for your money!"

Suddenly he darted
back and drew himself up before Alyosha, and his whole figure expressed
unutterable pride.

"Tell those
who sent you that the wisp of tow does not sell his honour," he
cried, raising his arm in the air. Then he turned quickly and began to
run; but he had not run five steps before he turned completely round
and kissed his hand to Alyosha. He ran another five paces and then turned
round for the last time. This time his face was not contorted with laughter,
but quivering all over with tears. In a tearful, faltering, sobbing voice
he cried:

"What should
I say to my boy if I took money from you for our shame?"

And then he ran
on without turning. Alyosha looked after him, inexpressibly grieved.
Oh, he saw that till the very last moment the man had not known he would
crumple up and fling away the notes. He did not turn back. Alyosha knew
he would not. He would not follow him and call him back, he knew why.
When he was out of sight, Alyosha picked up the two notes. They were
very much crushed and crumpled, and had been pressed into the sand, but
were uninjured and even rustled like new ones when Alyosha unfolded them
and smoothed them out. After smoothing them out, he folded them up, put
them in his pocket and went to Katerina Ivanovna to report on the success
of her commission.